Student Experiences

Stephen Steele

After having been over to Airdrie on about 4 GO Teams, and a couple of other times, I decided to spend half of my first year after university over at the mother church. I stayed in Airdrie from the end of August to the end of January, living with Tim and a SIS student.

Up until Christmas I was involved in the Semester in Scotland programme, which was taught by Dick and Andrew. So along with 4 students from America I participated in set reading in the mornings (Monday-Thursday), seminars in the afternoons and weekly cultural trips. The three modules we studied dealt with Systematic Theology, Reformed Evangelism, & Ministry Practicum. The highlight of this was studying The Christian Ministry by Charles Bridges with Andrew.

It was a great experience to be part of such an exciting church and such a loving congregation.

On Friday evenings, I helped out with the Covenant Kids club. On Sundays, I did a series of children's addresses on 'People who met Jesus' / 'Jesus the hero of the Bible' for the first two months. After this I moved on to do Psalm expositions of Psalms 41-49, and I preached twice in January. I also enjoyed being involved in other aspects of church life, such as CY, a couple of METs (going through the book of Genesis), and the autumn theology MET. These all provided opportunities to both study the Bible & get to know the people better. In January I also studied The Disciple Making Pastor with Andrew.

There were trials as well of course, not least in living with the sort of people who think that chips are the type of thing made by Walkers. But all in all it was a great experience to be part of such an exciting church and such a loving congregation.